Deeper Inside the Israeli Assassination Machine

A 1982 note from the chief of the Israel Defense Forces ordering that a plane carrying the P.L.O. leader Yasir Arafat be shot down.CreditMichal Chelbin for The New York Times.

By Ronen Bergman

Feb. 12, 2018

Often when a few people reveal a secret, others feel free to share their stories, too. This was the case last week, after The New York Times Magazine published an excerpt from my book, “Rise and Kill First,” about the secret history of Israel’s targeted assassination program. The excerpt focused on Israel’s numerous attempts to kill the P.L.O. leader Yasir Arafat, many of which were thwarted by Israeli officers worried that the sometimes spectacular schemes, which involved dropping bombs on crowded neighborhoods or shooting down civilian aircraft, threatened too much collateral damage and would amount to war crimes.

Immediately after the story ran, the Israel news media erupted in controversy. Some commenters were disturbed by the existence of the program; others were upset that it did not go far enough. The arguments were familiar. What was more interesting, though, was the reaction from people who were present at the incidents I described and at others like them.

One of the episodes in the Times excerpt involves the story of Uri Avnery, a dovish Israeli journalist who, during the 1982 Israeli siege of Beirut, crossed the lines from an Israeli-held sector into the P.L.O.-controlled western neighborhoods with a photographer and a young reporter to meet Arafat. This was a controversial move. Israelis perceived Arafat to be their greatest enemy. His code name was “the Fish’s Head,” after the old saying that a fish rots from the head down. An Israeli special-ops task force that was set up to locate Arafat, code-named Salt Fish, knew about Avnery’s plan and decided to track his party until it reached the meeting place and then strike. An argument broke out among the military men and intelligence operatives involved as to whether they should endanger the lives of the three Israelis. On this occasion, in the heat of the battle and perhaps because some of the officers held the left-wing Avnery in contempt, it was decided not to let his party’s presence foil the plans to dispose of Arafat. Ultimately, however, Arafat’s security team was able to shake the operatives who were trailing him, and the decision remained a theoretical one.

In the wake of the Times article, Avnery wrote about the episode from his own perspective, for Ha’aretz. A German journalist, he said, had suggested that he interview Arafat and gave him his office telephone number. “I hurried to my hotel room and dialed the number,” he wrote. “An Arabic-accented voice answered. I said that I was Uri Avnery from Tel Aviv and I would like to meet with the Ra’is” — the president in Arabic. “‘I’ll call you in the evening,’ the man answered. I was certain nothing would come of it.” Salt Fish, monitoring many of Arafat’s phone calls, learned of the plan. Late that night, the phone rang in Avnery’s hotel room and he was told, “Be at the museum checkpoint at exactly 10:00 tomorrow. A man named Ahmed will be waiting for you.”

“The route to the meeting place was a bit odd,” Avnery recalled in Ha’aretz, “we drove in crazy zigzags, back and forth, right and left. I presumed Arafat had instructed that they take careful measures to ensure I wouldn’t be able to recall the way.”

His conclusion, after reading about the thwarted Israeli plot: “ I am very glad now about all the precautions that Arafat took.”

One of Israel’s biggest daily newspapers, Yedioth Ahronoth (where I am a staff reporter), led the paper with the story from my Times article about how the chief of the General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces, Lt. Gen. Rafael Eitan, had decided, in the midst of the fighting, to take the navigator’s seat on a fighter bomber and head to Beirut with the aim of killing Arafat himself. After the story appeared, the Israel State Archives released for publication a passage from a cabinet meeting protocol in which Prime Minister Menachem Begin rebuked Defense Minister Ariel Sharon and General Eitan about the enormous danger and lack of judgment inherent in such a move. “I support courage,” he said. “I am against bravado.”

Two days after the story was published, Ehud Barak, a former prime minister, told me about another previously unknown conversation, about the moment when Sharon returned Arafat to Israel’s hit list. (The Mossad had recommended in 1974 that he be put off limits because he had become an international political figure.)

In September 1981, Barak was a member of the I.D.F. General Staff. Sharon, having just been appointed defense minister, was at the first meeting of the staff. He asked Eitan, whose nickname was Raful, how it was possible that Arafat was still among the living. Barak recalls that Eitan explained to Sharon that the politicians would not authorize killing him. Sharon replied sarcastically: “You know, Raful, when I was your superior officer in the paratroopers, we didn’t wait for the politicians to initiate operations. We used to look for things to do all the time to protect Israel and the Jews, right?”

Barak requested the floor so he could support the chief of staff. A few years previously, Barak told the staff, he had conceived of a complicated plan to kill Arafat, but it had not gotten the green light from the prime minister because Arafat’s name had been removed from the list of candidates for assassination. Sharon was not persuaded.

“So, please take note of this,” Sharon declared. “From now on, Arafat is back on the list, and at the top of it.”

Eitan did take note. The attack orders that followed were often surprisingly explicit. After the Times excerpt ran, David Ivry, the commander of the air force at that time, showed me a document with two holes punched in it, from when it was stored away in a binder. It is handwritten, from Eitan, and it reads:

“David, It is possible that Arafat will be flying from Damascus to Saudi Arabia in a [S]audi plane. If this is the case — it is to be shot down. A good site must be chosen above the Saudi/Jordanian desert.”

The operation never happened. Ultimately, a group of young officers acted according to the military’s ethical code and spared Israel from being permanently tarnished by a terrible act. That part of the story, too, has been secret until now.